Chapter 650

"Who knows how long this peace will last!"

Walking through the city, Shen Yu was now in Lincheng; the streets were bustling with people, vendors shouting incessantly, a scene of lively prosperity.

But as Spirit Qi continued to grow, those ancient monsters would revive one by one, and when that time came, these common folk would become their rations.

By then, the sight of white bones stretching for thousands of li and no rooster crowing for ten thousand li would likely be everywhere; today's bustling prosperity would turn into mournful wails.

Before this, he had already sent word to Chen Xing, Governor Chen—that the Spirit Qi Surge in the Forbidden Land had reappeared, the Great Contention Era was unstoppable, urging him to prepare early.

Moreover, he had ordered Chen Xing to mobilize large numbers of commoners to migrate to Xiaozhou, where he had once painstakingly layered one Array after another, and left behind an External Incarnation to hold the fort.

The series of arrangements he made when governing Xiaozhou in the past have now proven useful.

Surely even those ancient monsters would need to expend considerable effort to destroy those layered Arrays, and with that effort they would have already gone to hunt easier prey elsewhere.

Furthermore, the Arrays in Xiaozhou are constantly being refined; the later they are, the greater their power, which should be sufficient to protect the commoners residing in Xiaozhou.

As for other places, Shen Yu currently has no better solution—he can only rely on his own head to bear the brunt, and he doesn't know whether his frail frame can withstand it.

Actually, when Spirit Qi first erupted and wasn't yet so turbulent, he had also considered entering the Forbidden Land like Mu Zishan did, to block the relentless downward flow of Spirit Qi.

He possesses the External Incarnation technique, capable of producing incarnations with power nearly equal to his own, using them to substitute himself in suppressing the Forbidden Land.

He thought it was a perfect solution, but reality gave him a resounding slap—in fact, he had overestimated himself.

The Spirit Qi Surge resembles a tide: after the initial most turbulent wave passes, the surging Spirit Qi begins to ease, and it was then that Shen Yu started attempting to rush into the Forbidden Land.

Yet reality proved rather harsh—he tried several times, and multiple incarnations were shattered by the turbulent Spirit Qi.

In the end, he helplessly realized that with his current strength, it was fundamentally impossible to suppress the Forbidden Land.

Thinking of this, Shen Yu couldn't help but let out a soft sigh, wondering how Mu Zishan managed it back then.

Back then, Mu Zishan could do it, but now he cannot. He doesn't know whether it's because his own strength falls far short of Mu Zishan's, or because the current Spirit Qi is far more ferocious than before.

But the Spirit Qi Surge shows no sign of stopping; those ancient monsters revive one after another, and the world falls into endless tribulations. Moreover, no one knows how great an impact this Spirit Qi will have on the world.

With such turbulent Spirit Qi, not to mention humans—even plants and animals are nourished; whether they will undergo changes remains unknown.

According to Shen Yu's knowledge, during the Spirit Qi Surge, those ancient monsters kill on sight, and the stronger the expert, the more delicious they are to these monsters.

Top experts across the world were basically slaughtered to extinction; those who managed to cling to life are few, and the records left behind are mostly written by low-Martial-Arts scholars, and even those are scarce.

Yet from these few records, one can see the dire state after the Spirit Qi Surge—this is also why generations of experts are willing to sacrifice their lives without hesitation; they fight not only for the world, but also for themselves.

Earlier, Shen Yu had also obtained books left behind by the Shadowless Sect; the very purpose of the Shadowless Sect's existence is to find ways to survive the Spirit Qi Surge.

Afterwards, they collected every move made by the revived experts, seeking their weaknesses, silently accumulating knowledge.

This is the purpose of the predecessors of the Shadowless Sect across generations—they hope that one day someone will rise, based on the expert intelligence they gathered, to eliminate those ancient monsters one by one, ending the millennia-cycle of recurring slaughter.

Therefore, the records in the Shadowless Sect contain only information about those ancient monsters, nothing else; they aim to conserve paper as much as possible, recording only what matters most.

No matter how this world changes due to the Spirit Qi Surge, human calamity will far outweigh other disasters. Even if this world undergoes tremendous change, it is absolutely impossible to cause a scenario where not one in a thousand commoners survives, not one in ten thousand.

Only human-caused disaster, only people eating people, can reduce the world to such ruin!

"What person?"

As Shen Yu walked down the street, frowning deeply in thought about the series of changes brought by the Spirit Qi Surge, he suddenly felt someone approaching from behind and instinctively dodged to the side.

Immediately after, a pretty young girl in a white ruqun nearly stumbled and fell to the ground due to his sidestep.

But the girl seemed unfazed; after regaining her balance and seeing he hadn't turned around, she charged at him again, her posture suggesting she wanted to grab him from behind.

Yet this time, she still missed. The girl lunged forward again, and again came up empty.

By now, after repeated misses, even a fool would know something was wrong.

"Young master, young master!" shouted loudly from behind, the girl seemed somewhat angry, stamping her feet in place.

Her chest heaved with anger, drawing frequent sideways glances from nearby people; even Shen Yu, under his Super Perception, couldn't help but glance twice.

The girl behind him had skin like snow and jade, a face that could be called peerless, her aura as gentle and beautiful as flowing water, as if pure innocence hid a hint of mischief.

Her movements were light and agile, clearly trained in martial arts, and her lightness skill was not weak.

Upon seeing a beautiful girl, Shen Yu also couldn't help but stop and glance twice—of course, just looking, nothing more.

He didn't know what this girl meant, lunging at him like that—could she have some peculiar fetish? These days, even men strolling the streets aren't safe.

But looking at her appearance, it seemed there was little to lose by indulging.

"Young master!"

Seeing Shen Yu stop, the girl took two more steps forward, a look of pride crossing her face—just saying, with her looks, how could anyone possibly resist her?

Then the girl seemed to lose balance, staggering as she lunged toward his embrace, her body nearly pressing against him—this tempting trace was all too obvious.

Yet Shen Yu still held her steady; at this close distance, every move of this little girl was under his control.

Immediately, the little girl took advantage of him supporting her, her hand swiftly brushing across his body. Under Shen Yu's Super Perception, this was all too clear.

"Older sister, I'm not a good person, but I can't resist temptation—this thing, one is okay, two is okay, but three is not."

"We are a young man in the prime of our blood and energy, you are a beauty of a hundred charms and a thousand graces—if we lose control, have you considered the consequences?"

"I stretched out once and that was enough; now you want a second stretch—is that giving you face or what? If you keep this up, I'll fight back."

"Young lady, words are words—don't let your hands wander!"

"Just saying—how could such a pretty girl throw herself into someone's arms for no reason? Obviously, she's here to steal something."

"Only she picked the wrong target—Shen Yu's current outfit is indeed expensive, at first glance clearly belonging to someone very wealthy."

"Of course, in fact he really isn't short of money; the only problem is that all his belongings are hidden in his own storage space."

"You search him from head to toe—if you can steal even half a wen, you win."